He's obsessed with vulnerabilities. He's worked so hard to avoid them in his own life - even giving up alcohol to remain in control - that he's now hardwired to find them elsewhere. And he'll use whatever tools he can to seek them out. Even Google.
Johnny and his team found that if you tailored a search just right, Google gave up the goods not only on people, but also on computer networks. At home, he tested Google's limits looking for particular types of files or flubs that revealed way-too-detailed error messages, vulnerable servers and, yes, passwords. ("PASSWORDS, for the LOVE OF GOD!!! Google found PASSWORDS!" Johnny wrote on his Web site.)
He started posting some of his Google findings and, after a short while, drew a following of fans.
And before he knew it, Johnny was on his way to being famous - among those impressed by that kind of thing, anyway.
"He's made a name for himself in that arena," says Jeff Moss - a k a "The Dark Tangent" - who founded the DEF CON hacker convention in Vegas in 1993.
When the DEF CON committee selected speakers in 2003, Johnny's name was on the list. It's been there every year since.
"There's probably a handful of people that you know will fill a room, and Johnny's one of them," said The Dark Tangent, who's based in Seattle. "He's pretty much a rock star."
Celebrity status
Surprisingly, rock star proved not to be enough. Johnny figured that out after DEF CON.
So he outed himself as a Christian, and hoped by simply saying it publicly, it would actually take hold, even if it ruined his professional reputation.
For all her devotion, his mother, Sharon Long, wasn't sure it was the wisest professional course.
"I don't think we live in a culture that sometimes wants to hear about spiritual matters," she said. "Putting his faith out there ... was taking a risk."
In other words, he'd just dared fate to quash his career.
Instead, it took off.
Despite Johnny's worry, pretty much nobody noticed his post - or didn't much care if they did. Within a month, a publisher had called and asked Johnny to write a book (Volume 1 of Google Hacking for Penetration Testers was published in 2005, and Volume 2 hit the shelves last year). That led to a dozen more book projects.
He became a talking head on CNN, MSNBC and CNET. Within a year, there were more than 80,000 users registered on his site - johnny.ihackstuff.com - up from 500.
